


When I Grow Up...

by blueconstellation



Series: Lance Bday Week [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Stargazing, death mention, injury mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-07 09:23:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11620659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueconstellation/pseuds/blueconstellation
Summary: Lance is down after a hard battle, Keith talks him through it





	When I Grow Up...

**Author's Note:**

> Part 3 of my Lance Bday Week series
> 
> Day 3 - Love/Comfort
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> I'm on tumblr [here](http://adhd-lance.tumblr.com)

As soon as Lance landed Blue, he hightailed it out of the hangar and away from everyone else. Normally, he stayed with her for a while, making sure that any damages were fixed and just talking to her. Right now, he just had to get out of there. He didn’t want to think about what had just happened, and every second he was with Blue or the rest of the team made him feel worse. 

 

 

Voltron had been attempting to free a planet called Astaua from Galra control and, while it started out easy enough, that changed all too quickly when a whole new fleet of ships came to join the fight. Hunk and Keith had been on their way to help move a bunch of Astauans hiding in a building to a safe area on the planet when a group of ships dropped down from above and opened fire on the place. The two paladins engaged and took down the ship as fast as they could, but they weren’t fast enough to save everyone. Meanwhile, Lance had been distracted by his own group of ships firing at him. He had emerged from that relatively unscathed, but Shiro and Pidge weren’t as lucky—they had been the target of the majority of the fleet and had sustained a good amount of damage to their lions.

 

 

All in all, it was a hard battle to win, and it was hard to feel victorious when there had been so many Astauan casualties. So, Lance was tired and angry and wanted to forget about all of it.

 

 

He wasn’t really paying attention to where he was going, just getting as far away as he could, but he found himself up on an upper level observation deck. It made sense—he always went up there when he needed to calm down. He even had a blanket from his room folded up by the door. He picked it up and stepped outside, pausing to close his eyes and revel in the calm night, then sat down near the edge. 

 

 

Lance wasn’t sure how long he stayed out there, but he knew it had been a while. Which was why he wasn’t that surprised when he heard the door open behind him and someone walk over to where he was laying. He sighed and opened his eyes. Keith was squatting down behind his head.

 

 

“How you doing?” he asked quietly. Lance just closed his eyes again. Keith apparently took that as his cue to lay down too, because when Lance opened his eyes again, he was staring right back from beside him. Lance looked back up at the stars and shrugged. 

 

 

“What are we doing, Keith?” Keith furrowed his brow and lifted his head a little to look at Lance.

 

 

“What do you mean?” he questioned. Lance gave an aborted gesture in front of him.

 

 

“Voltron. Saving the universe.  When does it end?” he trailed off then started again, quieter, “It just seems like the more planets we save, the more that need our help. How much of a difference are we actually making?” Keith stayed quiet. There wasn’t much he could say to ease Lance’s mind, so he just nudged Lance’s shoulder with his own as a show of silent support. 

 

 

They fell into comfortable silence. Keith had started mapping the constellations he could see when Lance spoke up again. 

 

 

“This just isn’t where I thought I’d be.”

 

 

“Where did you think you would be?”

 

 

“I don’t know, just… not here.” Lance chuckled. “I mean, sure little kids dream about space and superheroes but… those are fairy tales, that kind of stuff never happens in real life.”

 

 

“What did you wanna be when you were little?”

 

 

“What?”

 

 

“Like when you grew up. What did you wanna be?”

 

 

“I don’t know- I mean, I was so dead set on being a fighter pilot for so long, I didn’t really consider much else beyond that. I guess I would’ve wanted to do what Shiro was doing, exploring the galaxy and all that junk. Which is what I’m doing now, so I feel like I should be happy about it but…,” Lance trailed off and shrugged.

 

 

“It wasn’t exactly your choice.”

 

 

“Yeah… but don’t get me wrong, I love what we’re doing and I love learning about everything wherever we go, I always have. I love that you never have to stop; there’s always more. Like, I worked my ass off at the Garrison; read every flight manual I got my hands on, did all the extra credit I could, I even stole Hunk’s books to read through at one point when I was bored. Still wasn’t enough for them, but I did the best I could’ve. Heh, when I got in, my family threw me a huge party, and I was so excited. Then I got there the first day and Iverson… it was like he got off on crushing dreams, ya know? Pidge, Hunk, and I were far from the best team—Pidge was young and trying to avoid attention like the plague all while still searching for her family, she didn’t have the room to really show her stuff; and Hunk’s a complete genius, but the simulator always fucked with his stomach—but we were all friends and we trusted each other. The Garrison didn’t care, the simulator was only for ‘promising pilots’. We still had a certain number of hours in it, but Iverson always used us as example of what  _ not _ to do.”

 

 

“You’re better than Iverson could ever dream of being.”

 

 

“How’d you get that conclusion?” Lance raised an eyebrow.

 

 

“Because you’re here, a damn Defender of the Universe. You being here is basically a big ‘fuck you’ to everyone who ever doubted you. You’re a lot more talented than you give yourself credit for.”

 

 

“Please, you’ve got miles on me in that department. You were the best pilot in the Garrison. You were practically a legend. I thought you had your whole life together.”

 

 

“Not really,” Keith laughed a little. “When Shiro disappeared, I kinda lost it. I tried to keep going with classes and everything, but I was just so consumed with not knowing. And no one would  _ tell _ me anything, which made it even worse. They kept saying it was pilot error, but they wouldn’t give me any evidence. I kept confronting them, hoping they would crack or something, but they just got tired of it and kicked me out for good. It probably would’ve ended up that way no matter what, though. Shiro was always the one keeping me on track; he got me in there so I wanted to make him proud, he inspired me. I was barely in class, and when I was I kept fucking things up. Iverson just expedited the process. They were probably glad to be rid of their pity project.”

 

 

“Obviously you weren’t a pity project. Shiro recruited you for a reason, Keith. You’re an incredible pilot and an amazing fighter and just super talented in general. Sometimes life deals us really shitty cards, but in this case I think it was for the better. We brought Voltron back together, and we’re fighting the Galra every day. That’s crazy brave. Fuck the Garrison for caring too much about covering their own asses to realize they were losing their best pilot. When we go back there, you can give them the biggest ‘I told you so’ ever, then fly back into space in your giant robot lion. Ugh, that would be so badass.”

 

 

“Ha, it would.” Keith smiled out into space. “Wow, the Garrison really sucked.”

 

 

“Hell yeah, it did. How did we put up with it for so long?”

 

 

“No idea.” They let silence settle around them once more. 

 

 

Eventually they heard the others calling for them, and Lance sat up with a groan. Keith followed suit and together they stood and folded up the blanket. Lance looked up at the stars one more time before turning and walking towards the door, Keith on his heel. He stopped right in front of the door and turned to look behind him.

 

 

“Thanks, man. For coming to talk to me,” he said, the corner of his mouth turning up a fraction. “I appreciate it.”

 

 

“Anytime. We’re a team, remember?”

 

 

Lance nodded. “Speaking of team…,” he trailed off and they could hear Pidge’s voice getting louder. Keith laughed as they walked back inside.


End file.
